9/6/2008 - Seal Bay to Stonington, Maine (sitting out the remnants of Hanna) -- 9.2 Miles
Sunday morning we again had light fog in Seal Bay, and fog horns confirmed likely dense fog outside. The weather reports continued to predict a "Hanna event" for around midnight in this area, and we could see a couple of boats around us taking extra precautions ... laying out second and third anchors, wrapping their mainsail covers with line, taking down their bimini sun covers, etc. Although Seal Bay was reasonably well protected, we didn't like the longer fetches inside the little harbor and decided to move to Stonington at the south end of Deer Island, just across Isle Au Hout Bay from Vinalhaven.
With Bill driving from inside where he could watch Fugawi and the radar, Judy positioned herself at the bow to visually watch for lobster pots and other hazards while listening for fog horns and engines. Last Christmas Bill gave Judy two two-way radio headsets for Christmas. She may not have been suitably thrilled about that gift last December, but she was today. We usually use the headsets to communicate between the person on the wheel and the person at the bow while anchoring or picking up a mooring. Today the headsets became invaluable as we felt our way around the moving lobster boats we could see on radar but could not see visually until extremely close (yes, the lobstermen were actively working in the less than 1/2 block visibility). The headsets were also extremely valuable for communicating as we dodged the scores of lobster pots that kept appearing along the way. Bill lost count of the number of times Judy firmly spoke (yelled?) into the mic "pot dead ahead, turn to port NOW!" It was an intense hour and a half, but we made it into the little Stonington harbor while hardly seeing, or seeing only as vague shadows, the outlying islets we narrowly skirted on the way in.
In Stonington we took a mooring in the little working harbor of Billings Marine and Diesel. Billings is a working harbor in every sense of the word, not by any stretch of the imagination a marina or yacht club. And to compliment the working feel of Billings, there were scores of Lobster boats moored just down the way at the Lobster Coop. This was to be far from our most scenic stop, but from an anchorage or mooring standpoint it was about as secure as one can imagine. Plus the fog has a way of muting even the ugliest harbor.
The afternoon and early evening were eerie with heavy air and a stillness that told you something was going to happen that evening. However, luckily, Hanna turned into a non-event for us. Our mooring was so protected we hardly felt a ripple, although we understood the area did get hit with 25-knot and higher winds that night. We also slept through 7" of rain reported to have fallen that evening. Stonington had been a good choice.
9/7/2008 - Stonington to Rockland, Maine -- 20.9 Miles
Nick and Sherri on Sweet Time had travelled down to Rockland from Bar Harbor in the prior day's dense fog. We decided to join them at the "Journey's End" marina, reserving a slip for the night. 
Since we'd be spending most of our short trip winding through the circuitous Fox Island Thorofare between Vinalhaven and North Haven Islands (see photo of North Haven at left), we decided to simply motor today (in addition, our path on both sides of Vinalhaven as well as in the Fox Island Thorofare was littered with Lobster pots to dodge, making sailing even more nerve wracking than motoring).
Rockland was a pleasant surprise to us. It had the largest downtown we'd visited since Halifax. The town's main street ran for about 10 blocks parallel to the harbor, and was filled with galleries and restaurants. Nick and Sherri ate at a restaurant Nick's chef-son had raved about, run by one of the top chefs in the country. As tempting as that sounded to us, we were more eager to just walk the town a bit and eat lower key that night. We ended up eating at the Rockland Cafe, a little store front Rockland institution that was filled with people drawn for their seafood specialties. Judy had steamed whole lobster ($18.95). Bill had a seafood platter that could have served a small family. He couldn't come close to finishing it, and he ordered the "small" portion. What a find.
Nick and Sherri were going to spend at least one more day in Rockland, and we could easily have done that too, however we wanted to take advantage of a good weather window to move on down to Boothbay the next day. Plus, we had heard some very good things about Boothbay ... time to check them out for ourselves.
9/8/2008 - Rockland to Boothbay, Maine -- 44.3 Miles
Before leaving Rockland it was errand time. Our first stop, shortly after they opened at 7:00 am, was Hamilton Marine, just a couple of blocks from our boat. For you boaters, Hamilton stores in Maine are like a "walk-in" Defender marine catalog on steroids. They cater to both recreational and work boaters, and stock almost everything. We found some parts there we were sure they wouldn't have ... but they did. After a couple more shopping stops in town we were ready to go.
It was a perfect day, cloudless with 10-knot winds, the only problem being that they were again in the wrong direction. We tried sailing for a while, but tacking wasn't going to be too productive as we always found ourselves falling off (turning a bit downwind) each time we had to dodge a lobster pot. Turning up (upwind a bit) would put the boat in irons, stalling our progress and losing steerage just when we needed it most. After sailing about an hour we decided to instead motorsail with only the main. Later in the day we thought the winds had shifted enough to try sailing again, but they quickly came back to their prior SW heading, yielding the same results. It would be another motorsail day.
Most of our 44-mile course on Monday was littered with lobster pots. After about 30 miles the pots seemed to thin out a bit, leaving short stretches where we wouldn't see any in our way. But then they'd quickly return again. Maine's lobstermen sure take the pleasure out of pleasure boating. If we were ever to boat here again we'd want a full keel with the prop in an aperture and a cage guarding the prop, just like the lobster boats have, so pot lines could never get tangled. The lobstermen just drive right through these areas with no heed to the location of the pots. If we did that we'd quickly find ourselves towing strings of lobster pots, our shaft and prop stopped dead and tangled up with tightly wound lobster pot ropes. Should that happen, our only course of action would be for Bill to don his wet suit and jump into the cold water to untangle or cut us free ... not a fun prospect.
Luckily we didn't snag any lobster pots during our day's travels, and we were rewarded that evening with a beautiful mooring in Boothbay harbor as the local Boothbay tourist scooner took its last group of guests out for a short evening excursion. Appetizers in the cockpit topped off a perfect evening.
9/9/2008 - Boothbay, Maine, Lay Day
When we left Rockland on Monday we did that knowing the weather was supposed to be unsettled on Tuesday, leaving a perfect day to lay over in Boothbay for some exploring. That was a good plan from a sailing perspective, but not from a touring perspective. After breakfast and a dingy ride into the marina to settle up on our mooring and use their showers, we returned to the boat for a bit before hitting the town. During that bit the rains and winds came, keeping us on board for the next 3 or so hours. Finally the rain abated and we made a dash for town.
Boothbay is a tourist mecca, filled with galleries, gift shops, up-scale clothing stores, restaurants, B&Bs and quaint, impeccably maintained homes. Somehow it has managed to keep its charm while stepping up to tourism big time. For example, we saw no franchise restaurants, no plastic or neon signs, and no cookie cutter gift shops ... mostly very nice galleries with beautiful artwork, a wonderful bookstore, and authentic local restaurants with good food not too expensively priced. On the advice of a gallery owner we ate at McSeagull's (we were a bit concerned about the name, hoping they served something other than fillet of fish sandwiches). We found it informal and excellent. Per the gallery owner's advice, we dined on their excellent appetizers ... calamari, and crab cakes that seemed to be 100% crab. We'd go back.
After a wet dingy trip up-wind and against the waves, we returned to the boat just at dusk. Later the wind dropped to nothing. The high pressure zone must have found us. We were looking forward to a good travel window for the upcoming few days.
9/10/2008 - Boothbay to Richmond Island East Anchorage -- 35.5 Miles
We awoke to a beautiful clear sky and forecasts for NW winds for our jump from Boothbay to Richmond Island. Initially our heading took us almost directly down wind, so we only unfurled the headsail. That turned out to be a good choice, as not too much later we found ourselves rolling in part of the headsail in 20-knots true.
Wednesday was a difficult day for Judy. She had really looked forward to a day to wander around off the boat in Boothbay on Tuesday, but instead we had rain. Except for a trip to the marina and back in the morning just before the rain hit, we had been confined to the boat until about 4:00 p.m., when we finally got ashore under still-gray skies. Now we found ourselves moving again, but in heavy wind and 3-4' seas through the ever present Maine lobster pots. We both had grown more than tired of lobster pots, but they really spooked Judy. She doesn't like close quarters maneuvering anyway, but day after day of it can really become unnerving to anyone. We had heard that there are over two million lobster traps in Maine. We were pretty sure we'd seen almost all of them by now!
Adding insult to injury, as she was standing behind the house in the cockpit watching for lobster pots we took a rogue wave, the only one of the day, dousing her with salt water. It was not a good day.
Bill has been reading "Sailing Away from Winter" by Cape Breton Island author Silver Donald Cameron. The book covers essentially the same trip we've been taking since leaving Cape Breton Island. It's been an especially enjoyable and informative read as we've followed along the same path taken by Don and his wife Marjorie in 2004. We'd highly recommend it for people cruising theses waters. But back to lobster pots, here's what Cameron has to say about the Maine coast: "I wondered how far south the infernal lobster traps would continue to infest the waterways. Sandy Schulz called Maine "the confetti coast," because trap buoys were as thick as confetti dumped in the water. ... Time to get going. Time to escape from Maine."
We were feeling the same way. As beautiful as Maine is, navigating through the lobster pots just seems to ruin the experience. It was time to escape from Maine. The state may be a good place to cruise for six or eight weeks, where one can poke into a secluded cove for a few days, then move only 10-20 miles through the pots to the next spot to stop to chill out a few days again. However, for a delivery trip, which we're essentially doing right now to get ourselves south before the colder fall weather systems arrive, navigating Maine's waters has been no joy at all.
Often dark clouds have silver linings. Thankfully we were finally starting to see a marked decrease in the number of lobster pots, a phenomenon that continued the further south we travelled. Plus, at the end of the day we were rewarded with a beautiful anchorage at Richmond Island, just south of Portland, Maine at the tip of Cape Elizabeth.
For the Lake Superior boaters reading this, the Richmond Island anchorage is a lot like Tee harbor off Thunder Cape in Northern Lake Superior. Depending on winds one can choose either the east or west side. There is one marked difference between Tee harbor and Richmond ... the isthmus between the mainland and the island at Richmond mostly disappears at high tide. That said, seas of any kind hitting that isthmus should pretty much break up on the rock reefs before entering the other side.
We didn't have to worry about seas. The night was absolutely calm, and a beautiful sunset with its red sky at night portended a good day for tomorrow. However, it was starting to get chilly at night up here. On Wednesday evening Maine's weather radio was issuing frost warnings for the mountain region of the state. Can it be that time already???
9/11/2008 - Richmond Island, Maine, to Isle of Shoals, Maine/New Hampshire -- 41.4 Miles
Wednesday night's calm continued through Thursday, presenting us with a calm flat ocean and yet another day on the engine. Our destination was a small island group about 5 miles or so off the coast near Portsmouth, New Hampshire. The Isle of Shoals is actually a tightly-spaced grouping of several small offshore islands unique in that the Maine-New Hampshire border goes right through the narrow thoroughfare between them. Based on our experiences to date with the two outstanding Maine anchorages suggested to us back in Shelburne by Philip and Sharon on Evergreen, we anticipated the Isle of Shoals, another of their suggestions, to be one more excellent choice. We weren't to be disappointed.
The Portsmouth Yacht Club maintains several moorings in the Isle of Shoals harbor, free for anyone's use if not occupied by yacht club members. We had also heard that their moorings were almost always available mid-week. If we picked a mooring right on the state line we would likely be swinging between Maine and New Hampshire over and over again during the night. Hope we don't need to show our passports each time the boat swings.
One of the islands in the Isle of Shoals group is Star Island. Bill guessed it was the island where our church, the Unitarian Universalist Association, jointly with the UCC church, maintains a retreat and conference center. After securing our mooring and lowering the dingy, Bill buzzed in to chat with a couple of people on the complex's floating dock. Yes, it was the UUA Star Island. And yes, we should feel free to tour the grounds and buildings.
Back at the boat Bill donned his "official" Pilgrim House Unitarian Universalist Fellowship t-shirt, and we took the staff up on their offer. The facility was starting to wind down at the end of their conference season, and was hosting only a women's conference and a few individual retreaters that week. During the peak summer months the facility hosts up to 300 retreaters at a time and has about 100 on staff, including everything from housekeeping, to kitchen and catering, to grounds keeping, plus of course camp counselors and retreat facilitators. Quite the operation.
Although lying only 5.5 miles offshore and about 8 miles southwest of Portsmouth, New Hampshire, Star Island felt truly remote ... the perfect spot for a retreat center. All the islands in the grouping are rocky and totally exposed to the open ocean. Just north of Star Island the largest Island, Appledore, has a few private residences but is primarily a nature preserve and research center operated by Cornell University. The islands were originally home to a fishing community, but at the turn of the century Star Island became a hotel retreat for the wealthy. 
The old hotel, built around 1912, now serves as the heart of the UU & UCC retreat center, with dining and conference facilities on the first floor and rooms above. A number of surrounding cottages provide additional lodging facilities, as well as tennis courts and other facilities.
A small chapel occupies the highest point on the rocky island. Originally built of timbers from a wrecked Spanish ship in 1685, then rebuilt of wood in 1720, and later burned as the result of an accident in 1790, 
the chapel was subsequently rebuilt in stone in 1800 ... the same structure still being used today. Lots of history here.
Around 5:00 in the afternoon Alfredo and Nicolleta on Jancris arrived, having come all the way down from Boothbay in one long hop. We had been in radio contact that afternoon, and agreed to rendezvous here. The last we had seen them was the day before we left Shelburne, Nova Scotia, as they left to take several daytime hops on their way to Maine, rather than the long overnight. As a result they cleared into the US at Mount Desert Island, about 35 miles further northeast in Maine than we did. Since then they had been slowly catching up with us, as they needed to be in Boston the following Monday. It was good seeing them, as we compared Maine cruising notes aboard Jubilee that evening. They, too, were tired of navigating Maine's lobster pots. They noted that one anchorage they had tried in Penobscot Bay was so clogged with lobster pots there was no where one could even consider anchoring overnight. In our humble opinion, Maine's lobster industry appears to be out of control.
We all retired early for tomorrow's departure to Marblehead Harbor, in hopes of getting around Cape Ann and in to Marblehead in advance of the predicted higher winds over the next few days.
9/12/2008 - Isle of Shoals to Marblehead, MA -- 42.1 Miles
We left our mooring about 7:15 to head SSE in choppy head seas to a 10-knot SSW wind. It was going to be another motorsail day to get enough punch to cut through the chop while staying close to our rhumb line. These opposing winds increased until at Cape Ann we were seeing 15-20 on our nose and short, steep, choppy, 4-6' opposing seas, including the occasional wave which buried our bow. Turning the corner at Cape Ann helped, as we were taking the seas at a bit better angle, but we were in for a rough ride the rest of the way to Marblehead.
However, the good news was that as soon as we left Isle of Shoals, leaving Maine waters and entering New Hampshire, we saw far, far fewer lobster pots ... in many stretches none at all! We did encounter a few commercial and sport fishermen, and did see the occasional fishing net flag, but it appeared we were out of the scourge of Maine's lobster pots! Three cheers for New Hampshire and Massachusetts!
We arrived in Marblehead early enough Friday afternoon to do a little touring and grocery shopping in the misty-wet weather, followed the next morning by some serious exploring as the skies cleared for a beautiful day (see above photo of part of Marblehead harbor showing some of the over 1000 boats on moorings ... $100.00 bonus to the first person who can spot Jubilee in the photo). 
Marblehead is a mostly residential town, with narrow twisty-turny streets and block after block of homes and shops mostly built in the 1700's. 
Almost every home had a little plaque listing who the home or business was originally built for or by, and when. It was like walking into a living architectural museum. We started our Saturday morning with breakfast at a Marblehead institution, the Driftwood (see photo at left), 
a little shoebox of a place that must have been there for at least 200 years, probably more. Another stop we particularly enjoyed was the Civil War Museum and historic Marblehead G.A.R. (Grand Army of the Republic ... see photo of building with bunting) meeting room in the old 
City Hall building, preserved exactly as it had been post-Civil War.
The most prominent structure seen from Marblehead harbor is Abbot Hall (the present City Hall and Museum), built in the 1870s and sited on the highest point of land in the city. Several prominent churches with their steeples similarly stand out. In a word, we loved Marblehead.
9/13/2008 - Marblehead to Salem, MA -- 3.5 Miles
Returning to the boat early Saturday afternoon we cast off our mooring and made the big 3 1/2 mile jump over to Salem, where Jancris was anchored. Shortly after arriving we took the marina launch ashore for a quick orientation tour of the city.
Salem couldn't be more different than Marblehead. The city was equally old (
see photo of oldest middle class house in Salem), with several historic attractions ... e.g. the House of Seven Gables, the huge Peabody Essex Museum, a Witchcraft Museum, and tons of gift shops, restaurants, and waterfront attractions. But notwithstanding the serious touring sites, people seem to come to Salem mostly for its witch trials history. Store after store had trinkets for purchase around that theme. There was even a wax museum on witches. The town was nice, but the witchcraft theme was a bit much. We preferred the quiet of Marblehead.
9/14-15/2008 - Salem Lay Days
We ultimately decided to remain on our mooring in Salem for three nights. On a rainy Sunday we did laundry, changed engine oil and transmission fluid, and generally were waiting out some unstable weather and the remnants of hurricane Ike as it tracked north of here on Monday, leaving us warm humid temperatures and wind, but clear skies. A high speed catamaran shuttle departing from near our marina runs between Salem and Boston, so we along with Alfredo and Nicoletta took advantage of that for a Monday Boston visit rather than taking Jubilee and Jancris all the way into and out of Boston Harbor.
The ferry ride was fast and smooth, notwithstanding the morning's choppy seas and 20-25+ knot winds. The entire trip took only 45 minutes, dock to dock. We would have spent several hours covering the same distance with Jubilee (although our fuel bill would have been much lower than theirs).
The view of Boston when approaching from the water is breathtaking. Our compressed one-day city tour was equally breathtaking, but in a different sense of the word, as we covered one end of the historic downtown area to the other on foot. Every twist and turn in Boston seems to uncover some historical building or location of note nestled in among the city's modern office buildings. 
A good example is the Paul Revere house. Originally built in 1680, Revere occupied the home for about 30 years, until about 1800, and raised his children here. The house is literally squeezed in between commercial buildings.
Nearby is the Old North Church, where the legendary lantern was raised in the steeple to warn of British troop movements and initiate Paul Revere's infamous midnight ride to alert Samuel Adams and John Hancock in Lexington.
We also happened across one of the city's graveyards, which we learned contained the graves of three of the founding fathers (see the accompanying picture of John Adam's tombstone).
The Massachusetts State House, overlooking Boston Commons, was another impressive historic site. We were surprised to find, 
immediately to the left of the capitol, the UUA headquarters. UU roots run deep in Boston, as they do in much of New England. For example, King's Chapel, built in 1686 as an Anglican Church, subsequently changed affiliations to become the first Unitarian congregation in America in 1787. 
When visiting St. Stevens, the Catholic Church where Rose Kennedy was baptized and buried, we learned that church was originally built as a Unitarian Church. And the UUA headquarters halls were filled with plaques of historically famous UU's, such as Susan B. Anthony, Albert Sweitzer, Daniel Webster, and others.
Not far from the Capitol we strolled into a district filled with Irish pubs. One of their sign boards caught our eye ... "1 1/4 Pound Boiled Lobster - $10.00 - before 4:00pm". It was 2:00pm and we hadn't eaten yet. We asked what came with the lobster. The answer was "...butter, but you can get any sides for just $1.50 more". Sold! Lobster for Lunch!
Around 5:00 we rejoined Alfredo and Nicoletta at the ferry wharf for the trip back to Salem. The seas had calmed considerably during the day, making for a smooth quick ride back to Salem and our boats. Tomorrow promised to be a good day as we started moving on toward Cape Cod and points south.
9/16/2008 - Salem to Plymouth, MA -- 43.4 Miles
Early Tuesday morning we dropped our mooring and headed for Plymouth, MA, in a light northerly breeze. Although we had raised the main just before we dropped the mooring, we found the wind less than even the 6 or 6 1/2 knots we wanted to make in order to reach Plymouth at a reasonable time. It was going to be another day on the iron jenny.
Several other boats were moving south along our same route today, all, like us, heading toward the Cape Cod Canal. At one point we had 6 sailboats within sight, all heading south. Some folks, especially power boaters, might say that we sail boaters don't have the sense that God gave geese, but today at least proved that we share some of the same instincts with the birds.
By a little after 2:00 pm we had arrived in Plymouth after following a circuitous path through the bay, which appears large and open but in fact is mostly a shallow sandy tidal basin. Even the mooring area within the breakwall has large areas that reduce to only a couple feet of depth during low tide. How the Pilgrims got through this area with the Mayflower to "step off" on Plymouth Rock is beyond us.
After going ashore our first order of business was to see "the Rock". We were underwhelmed. To protect the rock a portico viewing area has been constructed, allowing folks to see but not touch. In previous decades and centuries others have not been very careful with the rock, and large portions have been chipped out and patched with cement! During our visit the portico was undergoing major reconstruction, with much of the area screened off by chain link fence. However, since it was low tide we climbed down the rocks (despite "do not climb on the rocks" signs), and snapped a picture from the beach-side. We had imagined a large craggy rock. Instead we found what Bill thought looked like a huge, 6 or 7' potato. Check that one off. We have seen the rock.
After looking at the rock we wandered over to the Mayflower replica. She sure doesn't look like a boat we'd choose for an Atlantic crossing, but vessels like this were the ocean liners of their day.
Alfredo and Nicolleta dingied in to shore while we were at the Mayflower. They had been in Plymouth last year, and were on a mission to pick up some lobster bisque at the seafood shop on the wharf. We followed their lead and did the same plus purchased a couple of crab cakes, to go with our grilled steak that evening. Both were great!
While heading back to the boat we strolled up into the town to see the longest continuously used church site in the US, first organized in 1620. The church has been a UU church since 1800. 
Sharing the same square with this first Plymouth, MA, church is the Church of the Pilgrimage (see photo at right), a UCC church that was formed in 1801 by 52 members unsatisfied with the 1st church's affiliation with Unitarianism. Interestingly, today some UU ministers are trained in UCC seminaries such as the UTC in New Brighton. How things change yet remain the same.
We've thoroughly enjoyed our time amidst the beauty of Maine and the history of Massachusetts. As we leave Plymouth tomorrow morning for the Cape Cod Canal, we'll be entering another very different area of the east coast as we move from northern New England to southern New England and Long Island Sound. But more on that in the next blog posting. Stay Tuned.
